


Brothers With Bad Timing

by Wearing Cardigans (Haelblazer)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angels are Dicks, Arguing, Attraction, Belligerent Sexual Tension, Castiel's Handprint, Interrupting Sam, M/M, Naked Dean, Oblivious Sam Winchester, Season/Series 04, Towels, Voyeur Castiel, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-27
Updated: 2015-01-27
Packaged: 2018-03-09 06:56:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3240476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Haelblazer/pseuds/Wearing%20Cardigans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just as Dean and Cas start to realize their mutual attraction, Sam develops a case of bad timing. Set during season 4. Written 7-Sep-2009.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Request was for a fic where Cas and Dean are just about to act on their feelings but keep on getting interrupted by Sam. After a couple of times Sam realizes what’s going on starts mischievously trying to time his interruptions. I never did write the second part (with the majority of attempts/interruptions), but we've got some attraction, some unintentional interruption, and some classic season-four-spn-angels-are-dicks nostalgia.

Dean reached for his gun as soon as the bed shifted with an added weight to the left of where he was laying. His muscles remained tense even when the angel spoke.

“This is...odd.” Castiel’s voice was steady, though he was visibly vibrating along with the motel bed.

Watching the angel’s eyes glaze over as he stared open-mouthed at the ceiling, Dean relaxed again, rolling his eyes at his new companion’s habit of appearing beside him in this manner. He should have known, as soon as Sam left to restock on salt, that Castiel would appear while his brother was gone.

“You enjoy this.” Castiel slid his fingertips from side to side, feeling the vibrations travel up his hands.

“I enjoy…?” Dean’s first instinct was to look down at himself to make sure he wasn’t laying around with a subconscious hard-on or something. He’d actually been taken by surprise a few times when his mind had been focusing on other things. He’d be relaxing after a hunt, warm summer day, laying on the beach, and _bam_ , he’d be at risk for indecent exposure without even realizing it. Sam would hit him, ask him what his problem was, and Dean would swear he didn’t notice, but his brother would just roll his eyes and tell him to cover it up. This time he wasn’t even remotely subtle in looking down, but he was satisfied to see that his jeans were still flat–or at least curving out in a relaxed manner.

“The vibrations.” Castiel responded, and his voice was a reminder that Dean probably shouldn’t be laying there looking at his own crotch with an angel in the room.

“Oh,” Freckles camouflaged Dean’s blushing well enough as he realized that Castiel hadn’t been referring to Dean enjoying his presence on the bed beside him. He turned his gaze towards the poorly tiled ceiling, until his attention was drawn to a portion above the bed that looked to be a risk for a nasty concussion. “Kind of used to enjoying it by myself though.”

“Lately, yes, I have noticed you enjoying it by yourself.” The angel looked at him from the corner of his eyes. “Am I affecting your enjoyment? You seem to be shaking along just as well as you were before I joined you.”

“No, apparently this thing was built for two.” Dean answered.

The bed shook steadily, and Dean and Castiel lay there beside each other in silence, both of them keeping their eyes intent on the ceiling. The brothers had once again selected a room with two queen sized beds, so there was a decent amount of space on each bed, and Dean used this as a justification for why the two of them laying there wasn’t weird. Almost three minutes after Castiel’s last words, Dean crossed his arms over his chest defensively, then uncrossed them a second later to roll on his side to face his bed-mate.

“Did you just imply that I’m not getting laid?”

“Is that something you believe I would imply, Dean?” Castiel smiled softly, and it was so brief that it would have gone unnoticed if it hadn’t shown up in contrast to Castiel’s otherwise neutral expression, and if it hadn’t shown up at a time when Dean was particularly attentive.

Dean frowned at the angel curiously, while Castiel continued to stare unblinkingly at the faulty ceiling. His tie remained firmly fastened, suit remained unwrinkled, and his ever-present trenchcoat had spread out around his legs. He had even kept his shoes on, and he would have been the picture of uptight professionalism if he weren’t laying beside Dean in a crappy motel room on a vibrating bed. “If we’re gonna start noticing things, you know what I’ve noticed?”

Castiel angled his head just slightly, looking at Dean with somewhat divided interest as he was still taking in the sensation of being bounced around on the mattress.

“You only like popping into bed with me when Sam’s not around.” Dean pointed an accusing finger at Castiel’s nose, coming just short of poking him in the face, and the angel somehow looked directly at it without crossing his eyes.

“Do you feel that Sam is being left out of something?” Castiel asked, blue eyes staring back at Dean in what appeared to be genuine confusion.

Dean pulled his hand back and looked at the angel for a moment. It was hard to tell sometimes what Castiel understood, what human behaviors and interpretations were foreign to him. Unsure whether Cas was really confused or just avoiding Dean’s accusation, Dean decided to leave no room for confusion, breaking it down for the angel as if he was explaining something on a hunt. “Okay, I got used to you having no concept of personal space. But if you know it’s weird to pop up in bed with me when Sam’s here, then why don’t you think it’s weird to do it when he’s not?”

Castiel scrunched his eyebrows, and he squinted curiously at the hunter beside him. “Much of what I know about what is considered proper behavior, I have learned from you.”

“And what? I was in bed with women when Sam wasn’t here so you somehow think that translates to your…appearing acts?” Dean tried to think over their interactions, tried to remember sending a message to Castiel that the angel should hop into bed with him, but everything started to take on a double-meaning when he thought about it in that light, and he couldn’t think about the two of them exchanging a look of concern without it feeling like _I want to lick you wherever you hurt until you feel all better_ in retrospect.

Moving in a fluid rolling motion that seemed unaffected by the vibration of the bed, Castiel shifted onto his side so that his entire body was facing Dean. He looked over Dean’s face for a few seconds before speaking. “When I would arrive beside you and Sam was sleeping, you would appear nervous, you would get up. But if I arrived and Sam was _not_ present, you remained in the bed. It appeared appropriate for me to lay beside you, but only when you were alone.”

Dean blinked several times, trying to process what he had just heard. He _had_ gotten used to waking up with Castiel sitting in his bed, and really only freaked out about it when Sam was there because he didn’t want his brother to wake up and start ragging on him for having a man in bed with him.

“So you were...trying to figure out when it was okay to be close to me?” Dean asked just as the magic fingers came to a stop. Castiel appeared to be contemplating a response, and without the mechanical background noise, Dean felt as if the silence was filled with the awkward knowledge that he’d gotten entirely comfortable with Castiel’s appearances in his bed.

“I was.” Castiel responded simply, and then he blinked for what might have been the first time since his arrival. Dean looked him over, tussled black hair to scuffed black shoes, trying to figure out what was going on in the angel’s head, or heart, or soul–whatever it was that angels had. But before he could wrap his head around a question or a response, he heard the rustling of plastic bags outside the door and knew that Sam had returned from the store.

By the time the younger Winchester brother walked in, he found Dean lying alone on the bed farthest from the door, looking up at the angel standing beside it, and judging by the silence, Sam was pretty sure that whatever they’d been talking about, they didn’t want him to hear it.

∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§

Dean smiled back at the waitress, then turned his attention to the French fries she’d just placed in front of him. When he’d finished shaking on salt and ketchup, he popped five fries into his mouth and looked up to see Sam watching him with his mouth hanging open.

“Really?” Sam’s head was tilted so far forward in an attempt to convey disbelief that his hair was almost dancing on his upper eyelashes.

“Rfely whgt?” Dean spoke while still chewing, the still-solid ends of the fries hanging out of his mouth.

“You’re not hitting on her?” Sam watched the fries reduce in size as his brother chewed them into his mouth, ending up with a smear of ketchup across his mouth.

“On who?” Dean licked all of the ketchup off in on go, seemingly without thinking about it. Sam was kind of impressed.

“Our waitress.” Sam pointed over his shoulder. “Melanie? She made a point of making sure you had a nice view of her name tag.”

“Didn’t notice.” Dean looked over towards the booth where the top-heavy waitress was now standing. He shrugged. “Guess she’s not my type.”

“D cup. blonde, not your type. Right.” Sam nodded as if making note of this information.

“Apparently I am maturing, Sammy boy.” Dean smirked at his brother. “Why don’t you go for it, I’m sure she’d settle for close seconds.”

∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§

“Sam is out.” Castiel announced his arrival from behind Dean, who was on his way to grab a bottle of Sprite that Sam had placed on the dresser before they decided to get something to drink (and eat) at that diner instead.

“Those are some angelic powers of observation there. Next thing you’re gonna tell me the walls are puke green.” Dean spun around to indicate their less-than-attractive surroundings.

“More the shade of mashed peas.” Castiel looked around the room. “Perhaps if the person vomiting had eaten peas.”

Dean looked at the walls again and noted that the angel was correct, “Sam’s on a date.”

“Yes, Melanie Freeburn.” Castiel nodded, and Dean shook his head because _of course_ he knew who she was, the same way he’d known where Sam had been when he sent Dean off to find him with Ruby.

“Freeburn, huh? If that last name’s not a warning.” Dean shrugged off the fact that Castiel had this information. It wasn’t as if he was omnipotent, even if he liked to act as if he was when it was convenient. Dean twisted the cap on his bottle of soda, then failed to jump out of the way fast enough as foam sprayed over his face and t-shirt. “Damnit, Sam!”

They had called a truce on prank wars a long time ago, but that didn’t stop either of them from trying to screw each other over in little annoying ways here and there. The main thing that actually pissed Dean off was the fact that they’d been gone for at least an hour, yet the bottle had still been shaken up enough to get him soaked. That had to be magically enhanced carbonation.

He placed the dripping bottle back on the dresser where it had been sitting, then picked at his shirt, which was sticking to his chest and wet in spots. He mumbled to himself about how lucky Sam was that he had done that with a clear soda. The shirt was a dark gray that would have stained with a dark cola, but as it was it was just sticking to him annoyingly, so he pulled it off and used it to clean his face off.

When Dean lowered the damp t-shirt from his face, he was reminded that he had an audience, as Castiel remained standing where he’d first blinked in. However, the angel’s face was no longer neutral, the corners of his mouth turned slightly down. There was sadness in his eyes, eyebrows seeming to drape over them in two black frowns. He was staring at the handprint seared into Dean’s arm.

Dean looked down at the mark himself, and opened his mouth to make a sarcastic comment to lighten the suddenly somber mood, but couldn’t think of anything to say. Instead he shrugged and walked over to his dufflebag to grab a new t-shirt.

The silence was what some would call oppressive, and Dean wanted to put some fabric between that silence and the sight that had apparently caused it. He grabbed the first shirt he reached, a Stanford t-shirt that used to belong to Sam. Sam had almost thrown it out when he came to the conclusion that he was never going to have what he liked to refer to as a normal life, but Dean thought it would help them blend in on university campuses.

“I didn’t...mean to do that.” Castiel spoke to the back of Dean’s head again, and Dean was starting to feel like he was in a damn soap opera every time Cas did that, so he turned around.

“Hey, you said it yourself—gripped me tight and raised me from perdition. I’ve gotten worse.” Dean put his arms through the bottom of the shirt, and lifted his arms to pull it over his head, but Castiel was suddenly by his side, pushing Dean’s arms back down, and peering closely at the scalded skin.

“Wait.” Castiel’s eyes seemed to brighten to a paler shade of blue as he looked over the hand-shaped mark, then fading back to their usual shade. Cas sounded defeated when he spoke. “I can’t take it away.”

“It’s fine.” Dean tried to back away, but the angel held him steady.

“I wish that I could have brought you back without such a cost.” Castiel raised his eyes from the scar, looking up to meet Dean’s gaze. The hunter had that feeling that he was saying more than the obvious with those words, and the depth of it made him uncomfortable. Sometimes it was better just talking about the physical scars.

“No, Cas, it’s fine.” I like having it. It’s...” Dean tried to make it clear that he wanted to leave the subject alone, but he couldn’t even talk about why he didn’t mind having the image of Castiel’s hand burned into his arm without entering more uncomfortable territory. “I just like having it.”

Castiel nodded, placing his hand over the scarred skin. There was an obvious disparity between the handprint scar and the flesh and blood hand. These fingers the angel was using now, they were thicker, and slightly shorter, the palm not quite as wide.

“I almost expected that it would fit.” Castiel kept his hand in place, looking at the area that remained uncovered by his hand.

“It’s not Jimmy Novak’s hands that pulled me up.” Until a few seconds before those words came out of his mouth, Dean hadn’t even thought about Jimmy since that night in Pontiac when the guy gave himself up to save his daughter. Dean actually laughed a bit bitterly at his own ability to forget that Cas was riding around in someone else’s body. He moved to shake himself free again, and Castiel let his hand fall away this time, allowing Dean the space to put his brother’s old t-shirt on. “It doesn’t fit because you’re wearing some poor bastard around and it wasn’t his hands that pulled me up.”

“I thought it might have changed.” Castiel looked at the right hand that he’d been calling his own–blood and dirt under the nails, veins poking out closer to the surface when he was scared or excited or angry. He turned the hand over and examined the lines of the palm before lowering it to his side. “This became so much more than a vessel, I thought—”

“What do you mean ‘more than a vessel’?” Dean looked over the body that he’d associated with Castiel since the angel had introduced himself in a shower of sparks and deflected gunshots. From the hair to the clothes, to the somewhat chapped lips, everything looked the same.

“You were there, Dean. He gave this body to me permanently, he can’t come back.” The angel slid fingers over his jacket-clad forearms, watching them with fascination. “I thought this body—these hands—might have adapted to my presence.”

“That was…but why? Why would you need to keep his body?” Dean watched the angel look over the body that he was inhabiting, apparently for good. “Were those orders?”

“No, Dean, that was me.” Castiel stopped examining himself, and returned his full attention to Dean, who gulped and attributed it to how thirsty he had been. He shook his head and walked back over to the dresser to take a drink from the settled bottle of soda.

“So you picked a guy who was married with a kid?” Dean looked down at the bottle as he spoke, until he realized that he was just tilting it around trying to see if it would catch Castiel’s reflection. He put the bottle down.

“There was a lot more to Jimmy Novak than his wife and child. This was a man who needed more from life, who wanted to make a sacrifice, who felt–.”

“I’m not buying it,” Dean interrupted, looking up at Castiel again. “I mean Uriel and your dick of a boss, they’re riding around in these bald, middle aged men, who may or may not have had families, but who aren’t really inspiring them to hold on to those bodies forever. You pick this guy–young, good looking, fluffy head of hair,” Dean flicked his hand in front of his forehead to imitate Castiel’s scruff of hair, “ Just seems a little convenient.”

“There is _nothing_ convenient about this. In my search for a vessel, I was called by a righteous man who was willing and able to do the job. Your sexual attraction to his body would not have been a concern at that point.”

“Fair enough.” Dean nodded. “Was my alleged _attraction_ to that body a concern when you decided to take it over permanently?”

Castiel made a snorting sound that could have passed for a laugh if one did not know exactly how they were produced. “Alleged.”

“Yeah, _alleged_.” Dean was beginning to get offended. “Last time I checked, I pretty much go after someone when I’m attracted to them. And I haven’t exactly been trying to get in Jimmy’s pants, have I?”

“ _My_ pants. They’re my pants now, Dean.” Castiel looked as if he were going to step towards Dean, but his attention was instead drawn to the motel room’s door. Dean followed his gaze and a second later he heard Sam’s key-card in the door. “And the last time _I_ checked, you would not try to get into pants if you did not know who they belonged to.”

Castiel ensured he got the last word before Sam opened the door. Sam appeared surprised by Castiel’s presence, but didn’t have time to react as the angel immediately launched into a report on a professor in New Mexico who needed their assistance. He wished them luck and disappeared as soon as he was done, quickly glancing at Dean one last time before blinking away.

Sam glanced at Dean too, but his brother just rolled his eyes and said they’d better get some sleep before heading out to New Mexico. Sam wanted to ask if everything was okay, but knew that Dean wouldn’t talk to him unless he wanted to. It didn’t seem to be a big deal anyway. As muffled as their voices had been Sam was pretty sure he’d barely avoided walking in on his brother and Castiel arguing about pants.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pretty much everyone knows that Dean wants Cas. Meanwhile, Sam views things a little differently. Written 7-Sep-2009.

After stepping out of the shower, Dean wiped off most of the excess water dripping off of him, but he was still wet and wrapping a towel around his waist when Castiel opened the bathroom door.

“Jeez—.” Dean started to exclaim, but cut himself off and just shook his head. “I think it freaks me out even more when you use the door.”

“I arrived in the living area. The mirrors are fogging over…” Castiel shifted his gaze downward for a moment when Dean readjusted his slipping towel. “You take very hot showers, Dean.”

Dean looked at the angel in disbelief, allowing a few moments of silence to emphasize his expression of  _are you serious?_  before asking, “Did you just look down?”

“I heard you singing about the ‘heat of the moment.’” Castiel looked around the bathroom, noting that Dean and Sam had already removed all but two bars of courtesy soap.

“You did! You totally tried to check me out when I moved my towel.” Dean lifted both of his hands to point at Castiel, but his palms were turned up so the gesture came off more as if Dean were giving an explanation than making an accusation.

“Dean, if I wanted to see you naked, I could have simply arrived a few moments earlier.” Castiel pointed out.

“But how would you know when to show up without peeking in for just the right moment?” Dean only pointed one finger this time, but he still looked more like he was guessing the answer to a riddle than accusing Castiel of anything.

“I  _sense_. I do not  _look_.” Castiel clarified.

“You tried to look just now.” Dean responded, but Castiel remained silent. “Silence really isn’t helping you out here.”

Castiel made a point of looking down and keeping his eyes directed at Dean’s left hand, where he was ensuring the towel stayed closed. The angel then raised his eyes slowly until he was looking into Dean’s once again. “I believe that we are beyond denials at this point, don’t you?”

“Heh.” Dean huffed awkwardly in what was meant to be a laugh. He wasn’t sure what to make of Castiel’s forwardness.

The angel stood in the open doorway, watching Dean’s face, and not for the first time Dean wondered if he could read his mind. It looked as if he was trying—Castiel’s eyes intently watching his own—and Dean wondered how long he would stand there waiting for Dean to do something.

“I feel like you’re waiting for me to do something.” Dean unconsciously gripped his towel tighter, and he felt his own heart pounding in his chest. Why could he hear his own heart? Something was happening here. Something was definitely happening here. He licked his lips and saw Castiel’s eyes follow the path of his tongue.

Why is he watching my tongue?

“Did something happen?” Dean asked, looking over Castiel to see if he looked any more mussed than usual, but everything was in place. His hair was all over the place, but it was out of his face, and Dean had a clear view of the angel’s eyes, which were obviously roving up and down, taking in the sight of Dean standing damply in the middle of the bathroom.

“No more than usual.” The angel responded, eyes not meeting Dean’s as he spoke, and Dean started to get an idea of what the angel had been waiting for. Remembering their last conversation, Dean realized that Castiel had put himself in a position to prove just how attracted to him the hunter was, showing up somewhere he couldn’t really hide it. If that was the case, then Cas was doing a damn good job, because Dean could feel the blood rushing south and the towel wasn’t keeping any secrets.

“You’re just gonna stand there, aren’t you?” Dean lifted his chin, making his words seem like a challenge.

“I am.” Castiel finally met Dean’s eyes again, and the hunter saw that his pupils were definitely larger than they needed to be in this light. Even if the angel had just set out to prove how attracted Dean was to him, he was damn sure giving himself away in the process.

“And what if I just leave?” Dean shrugged, “What if I don’t feel like standing around being stared at.”

“Then you would need to pass through this exit.” Castiel pointed out with the tiniest of smiles. “Where  _I_  am standing.”

Dean tilted his head, squinting at the angel blocking his exit, and took two steps forward to place his bare feet two inches in front of Castiel’s dress shoes. He lifted a hand, placing it on Castiel’s hip and pushed softly, as if to move him out of the way, but the angel did not budge. Instead, Castiel mirrored Dean’s action, placing a hand on Dean’s hip, squeezing gently instead of pushing.

It felt to Dean as if the steam that had been slowly dissipating was now building up all over again. The air was thick, breathing was a labor, his skin was hot, and he felt light-headed. When he breathed in hard enough, his chest brushed up against the angel’s coat, and he felt oddly excited by the contact. His mind flashed a quick image of himself rolling around naked, wrapped in Castiel’s trenchcoat, rubbing it on his body....

_And full attention!_

Already knowing what he was going to see, Dean glanced down at the tented front of the towel wrapped around his waist. Castiel must have been waiting for Dean to look down, because as soon as he did, Cas tapped the towel, and it fell from around Dean’s waist, landing in a circle around Dean’s ankles.

“Point taken.” Dean didn’t even know if Castiel had been trying to prove a point, but he was standing there with his dick staring back up at him as a clear message that he wanted to bang this angel.

Castiel appeared more enthralled with examining Dean than anything else, and he ran a finger through the water droplets resting on Dean’s stomach, swirling in patterns that may have been a mimicry of artwork or angelic language for all Dean knew. The hunter was actually distracted from the building pressure in his groin, as his stomach warmed where the angel’s fingers passed. Dean could have sworn that even more steam rose where the angel’s finger made contact with the water on Dean’s body.

“Dammit, Dean, how is the mirror steamed up in here? Are you taking a shower with the door open? Because I can do without ever walking in on that again.” Sam’s voice seemed to echo in from the motel room’s main living area, and Dean jumped backwards at the interruption.

The angellically discarded towel was still wrapped around Dean’s feet, but Castiel caught Dean when he started to fall. One hand cradling his head, the other on his lower back, Castiel returned Dean to his feet. Cas allowed the hand Dean’s on back to wander lower as the hunter regained his balance, but only permitted himself a moment before disappearing before the younger Winchester brother reached the bathroom.

Sam stepped into the bathroom and found his naked brother bending over the pick up the towel at his feet. “Whoa, okay, not done.” Sam spun on his heel and left the bathroom in the same motion that he’d entered it.

“No, Sammy. Not done.” Dean grumbled as he finished drying off.

∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§

Sam and Dean had gone through two hunts before Castiel showed up again. Unfortunately, when he arrived he was cowering several paces behind Zachariah, head bowed and eyes averted from the brothers’ direction.

The two hunters and the two angels stood on either side of the Impala’s hood in the dirt driveway of a now un-haunted house in southern Nevada, and after the requisite arguing and banter, Zachariah launched into a speech that went largely ignored by Dean, who kept glancing over at Cas.

Finally, Zachariah sighed heavily. “I’m sorry, do you two need to take care of your unfinished business before we can finish talking about how to stop Lucifer?”

“I don’t hear  _us_ talking.” Dean’s eyes darted back to the elder angel’s face, using sarcasm and anger in an attempt to cover up the fact that he hadn’t even been paying attention to anything other than Castiel. “It’s just more of you being a dick about something you started.”

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you didn’t want to hear my advice on how not to get yourself killed.” Zachariah smiled and looked to the ground, shaking his head. He drew a circle in the dirt with his foot, keeping his voice casual as he spoke. “No one said you couldn’t enjoy yourself, Dean. We want you happy, and we want you safe.”

Sam felt as if he was eavesdropping on a private conversation, the way the angel was talking only to Dean, especially when he realized that Castiel hadn’t looked their way since arriving. He shuffled awkwardly, and his movement must have grabbed Zachariah’s attention, because the angel looked his way and his smile grew larger. Man, that was creepy.

“You know what would make me happy?” Dean spoke up, drawing Zachariah’s attention away from his brother. “Next time you have news for me, you go ahead and send Cas, ‘cause I’m done with you.”

“That is not Castiel’s place. If I have a message, I will deliver it  _myself_. You should appreciate the perks that we have already allowed you.” Zachariah leaned in, stage whispering so that everyone standing in the driveway could just barely hear what he was saying. “Especially when it comes to Castiel.”

Dean gritted his teeth, and he fought the urge to look over at Castiel again. “So your place is telling me something about Lucifer? Start talking, delivery boy.”

∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§ ∞§

On the drive back to their room, in the midst of a heated argument about the end of the world, Sam remembered that he’d meant to ask Dean about some of Zachariah’s more personal comments. “And what was that whole bit about perks? The angels allowing you perks?”

“Pretty sure he’s talking about me being alive.” Dean kept his eyes on the road, happy for the excuse not to look at his brother during this conversation. “After that corporate mindfuck he put us in, he did point out that I get to travel the country in a badass classic car.”

(He’d also noted Dean’s tendency to ‘fornicate with women’, but Dean didn’t want to bring that up and give his brother the chance to notice that he hadn’t been doing that so frequently anymore.)

“But he said it had something to do with Castiel.” Sam pointed out, watching his brother’s face for a reaction.

“Basic angel dickery—I don’t know.” Dean looked irritated and uncomfortable, like he wanted to change the subject but couldn’t think of a way to do it without it being obvious.

“Yeah, but this sounded like something specific—like something you’d know about.” Sam leaned in towards Dean, not hiding the fact that he was studying his brother’s face. “You two have been acting weird for weeks now…you didn’t make some kind of deal to keep them from punishing him for helping us out, did you?”

“Those fucks should know better than to give me that kind of ultimatum,” Dean’s voice was no louder than it had been, but his words were almost cut off when he spoke—a sharpness giving away his underlying anger.

“I’m sure they’ve done it with me. I know they’re not beyond it.” Sam wasn’t sure if pointing this out would incense his brother more, or make him realize that the angels’ behavior was something they were already used to; he spoke in a soothing voice and hoped for the latter.

Realizing that Sam was trying to calm him down, Dean became aware of his own over-reaction to the idea that the other angels would threaten Cas as a way to manipulate him; the anger in his own words about something that hadn’t even happened had taken him off guard, but he recovered as quickly as possible.

“Cas is a perk for  _them_.” Dean spoke in a calmer tone. “He’s the best chance those assholes have of keeping me in line.”

“Is that why that other angel brought him along? To make sure you didn’t just tell him to go screw himself when he showed up?” Sam asked, and Dean frowned about the fact that his brother had caught on to the other angels’ use of Castiel as some kind of carrot on a string before he did.

“Probably.” Dean answered.

“Hmmm.” Sam turned to face forward again, and Dean was relieved not to have his brother’s attention so hyper-focused on him. Sam watched the scenery become rural then residential then industrial as they neared their latest motel. When they pulled in to the parking lot, he finally verbalized what he’d been thinking. “So they basically use Cas as your pacifier.”

“My  _pacifier_?” Dean always paid close attention when parking, and it was probably the only thing stopping him from giving Sam an outright  _what the fuck are you talking about_  face.

“Yep.” Sam nodded, pretty sure this was an accurate description. “You start to bitch and complain, they bring out Cas to shut you up. He’s your pacifier. Or your blankie.”

Dean finished parking, turned off the car, then turned to look at his brother seriously. “Sammy, you get exactly one time to make that comparison.”

“But it fits.” Sam did a horrible job of pretending not to understand Dean’s problem with the analogy.

“You know what else fits? Your laptop in the sink the next time you call Cas my damn pacifier.” As they exited the car, Dean pointed at his brother to let him know he meant business.

“But blankie’s okay, right? Is it just the sucking thing you had a problem with?” Sam laughed, and Dean muttered a few curses, but Sam was already jogging ahead towards the room, knowing from experience that his long legs and the fact that he was carrying the room key were probably the only things standing between his laptop and a cold wet night.


End file.
